


Close

by ottermo



Category: Riverdale (TV 2017)
Genre: AroAce Jughead, Canon Compliant, Other, he just doesn't know there's a word for it yet
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-08
Updated: 2017-03-08
Packaged: 2018-10-01 03:44:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10179950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ottermo/pseuds/ottermo
Summary: Putting your face on someone else's face, it turns out, is pretty much exactly what it says on the tin.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * Translation into Русский available: [Личный](https://archiveofourown.org/works/10538238) by [lilizwingli](https://archiveofourown.org/users/lilizwingli/pseuds/lilizwingli)



> This show will have to prise aroace Jughead from my cold, dead hands. I may have said this before but now I'm talkin' real talk.
> 
> This is my way of explaining why unknowingly aroace Jughead might have done The Thing in episode 6, and why he might do The Thing again.

Jughead kisses Betty, and the earth doesn't move.

Or should that be "the earth doesn't stop moving"? Clichés need to pick a side already. 

Neither of them apply, anyway. There's no incredible shift as the universe rearranges itself, and no utter standstill in which time ceases to exist. Putting your face on someone else's face, it turns out, is pretty much exactly what it says on the tin.

Which is to say.... close.

That's about all he can muster in the way of adjectives.

And to be honest, it kind of bums him out? He's always just assumed he would eventually like someone enough that he'd enjoy kissing them. For the longest time, he'd wondered if it would be Archie, but recent reconciliations aside, standing him up for that road trip had set Archie back a good few places on Jughead's list of favorite people. 

It's not a long list. While Archie earns his place back, Betty has no competition for the top spot. But still he'd felt nothing he could describe as "wanting to kiss her", which was fine: that would come, at some point, so he'd been told.

Then, waiting outside Quiet Mercy for Betty to return, Jughead had found himself wanting desperately to be with her, making sure she was okay. Try as he might to keep thoughts of Jellybean at bay, he couldn't help comparing their situations, didn't want Betty to have any of those feelings because of her sister. Ever.

And it had all been so irrational, because really, if he _had_ been inside there with her, what could Jughead have done? Whatever the facts about Polly were, his being there wasn't going to change them, or change the effects they would have on Betty. And as soon as he'd realized how illogical his feelings were, Jughead had started wondering if this was what people meant when they talked about liking someone in "that" way. 

As in, more. Than other people.

He's still not sure why the existence of different "ways" is so often implied, when it's always seemed like different gradations of the same basic desire to be around people, as far as he's concerned... but then language is stupid and arbitrary in anyone's hands but his own. That's why he writes.

So he'd continued to nurse his new wonderings about Betty, in secret; the feeling of wanting to be near her became redundant once he _was_ , in fact, near her, and the feeling didn't get replaced by anything else.

At first.

Once Alice came into the picture, and Betty was screaming and crying as Polly was snatched out of her arms and dragged away, Jughead couldn't _bear_ it. His chest burned, as if his heart really was trying to go out to her, or if it really was being pulled apart, or as if someone really had clamped an iron fist around it and was squeezing it dry. Any of those figures of speech would do. And for the first time, Jughead could link them to someone outside his immediate family, someone he'd _chosen_ to care this much for. 

Did that mean he liked Betty as more than a friend?

Actually, he still hadn't been sure, because the idea that at some point someone stops being "just" a friend and passes over some invisible line into ...kissing partners, well, it just seemed made up, like the whole "different ways" thing. Just something people said because, as noted, they didn't know how words were supposed to work.

Either that, or it was just really hard to describe, and that's why none of the explanations made sense.

And if it's hard to describe, how is anyone supposed to recognize the signs?

Maybe, just maybe, Jughead had thought, you don't know that what you're feeling is the feeling of wanting to kiss someone, until the kissing satisfies the need. Then, in retrospect, you’ll know you were right to kiss them. 

Maybe Archie was right all along, when he said _you'll never know, Jughead, not until you try_.

And just now, back in her room, Betty had been getting that look again: like her heart was going to fall to pieces, only this time he wasn't trapped outside the convent or standing right next to her mother, he was here, alone with her, with absolutely nothing to hold him back.

She'd relaxed somewhat under his touch to her shoulder: that had given him a little more confidence. And when he'd told her _hey, we're all crazy_ , and _we are not our families_ , she'd seemed to drink in every word, as though his was the only truth she wanted to hear.

And so he'd began the sentence he didn't know how to end in words. A barely-formed " _also_..."

Which brings him here, now. Kissing Betty Cooper in what could be a scene straight out of a Bildungsroman or a Teen Choice movie: but instead, it's just what it is, and what it is is _close_.

They pull back, and Betty lets out a tiny sigh, her eyes still closed. The sound is dreamy, contented. As though the kiss had answered a question she'd been having, and answered it exactly right. Two check marks.

Jughead wishes his own question had been answered so concisely. But he's new at this. Maybe the sigh is part of it.

He lets out the breath he's been holding: a smooth, long exhale that he hopes Betty can interpret as easily as he'd interpreted hers, because to Jughead, his own sigh just sounds like breathing. 

Suddenly, Betty's eyes widen, and she exclaims, "The car!"

Of all the things he'd been afraid she might say, this one is so unexpectedly accessible that he smiles before wondering if it's strange, then immediately second-guesses himself.

"Wow. _That's_ what you were thinking about in the middle of our moment?" he asks. Too late, he wonders if the last word sounds a touch sarcastic, hopes he hasn't betrayed how little like a _moment_ it had felt.

Thankfully, Betty doesn't seem to notice. She's thinking about Polly again; they both are. The only way to test her story is to find the car... or fail to find it.

"One way or another," he reminds her. 

The possibility that Polly is lying seems slim, but it's there, and he'd rather remind Betty of it now than let it break her heart later.

Silently, she acknowledges that he's right.

"I need to know, Juggie," she says. 

He understands. Sometimes you do just _need to know_.

Hopefully, Betty will be able to reach a conclusion, because Jughead's quest for one of those has fallen a little flat.

As they prepare to leave for Route 40, he returns to the thought he'd had earlier, about all of this being like a movie. Maybe it's because he lived at the drive-in for so long, maybe that's why he tends to think in movie lengths. But what if it's wrong to expect it to all come together in a two-hour stint? Maybe it's not a one-sitting type of deal. Maybe love needs to be expounded in a trilogy, or, worse: one of those over-long TV serials, and he's only on episode six. It'll be a drag, but he can handle it. See it through.

He just wishes he could see a 'next time' trailer, to see if he ends up kissing Betty again. If the second time is different.

Maybe Archie was wrong after all, maybe you don't know until you've tried _twice_?

Jughead isn't sure, but he'll figure it out.

He always does.


End file.
